Road Babe Dispatch From Ada Ghana

Culture shock is something every traveler understands. It’s part of the gritty, harsh truth that no experience can be prepared for, especially when talking about immersion in a foreign world of unknown traditions, foods, languages and perspectives about life. For me, this is the impetus to go. The discomfort, the confusion, and ultimately the epiphany of what it means to be human, reveals who we are underneath the cloak of our context.

In Ghana, my culture shock was like one of those gnarly roller coasters, the rickety kind, that start off with a slow climb, reach a peak and drop you face first through a series of loops, twists and turns. As I traveled North, through jungles and into the dust, away from the salty breezes of the beach, I was changing languages, topography and customs. I was even changing myself.